Running Contacts

almost-3h long, 50 eur/64usd

Running Contacts That Make You Smile DVD covers the whole training process from getting the full out running, to flat plank work, raising the plank, adding challenges, turns, advanced exits, A-frame and running DW in trials, with a trouble shooting section within each chapter. The DVD features 30 different dogs of 16 different breeds on their journey to running contacts and addresses all the possible problems we encountered in Running Contacts classes.

147 Comments

Sorry to bother you here, but i have one quick question. 😉
I will start to train AF now with Hero and i would like to have running AF. Do you think i should try to get two strides or is this to optimistic and i should from beginning train one stride only?

Actually i have to work a lot now and i don’t have so much time to train anymore so i decided i will go for 2on2off on DW, it will go faster, considering i have to do a lot of preparation to put together setup for RC. 🙁 And I would like to start competing with him in spring that he will have more fun on competitions too, i have a lot of stuff to do until then so i decided so, yes, it’s just impossible to have it all by then. I’m hardly waiting for that, now that agility become great fun for him. 🙂 And i think he was somehow trained for 2on2off, because he get it immediately, maybe that explains all the problems we have with it. But i have planned something like that from the beginning, but running AF i would really like to have. 🙂 Now that nice weather will start and we will have almost all obstacles we will come to Handling to learn some more. 🙂

Hi Silvia, could you possibly have a look and see what I’m doing wrong please? 🙂 We started running contacts last winter but gave up as we weren’t making progress, started again at the beginning of this winter….not had as much chance to work on it as I’d like as it’s been so wet here!
We were getting over 80% success with low dogwalk (65cm?) and one particular start spot, went up to medium trestles (80cm?) as have nothing in between, and all of a sudden Dazzle is trying to take a stride out and do it in 4 strides! She’s still running, still showing separation, so missing not leaping, although if she put her front feet down I think she’d be there……..in 5 strides (6 hits) she’s there, but these are rare, mostly getting 4 strides/5 hits and a miss! I tried increasing the approach speed to see if she could get there in 4 strides, but she’s not big enough! Should we lower the height again? Find a start spot that gives us consistent 5 strides? Play the get that contact game? Very grateful for any feedback, as I’m tearing my hair out!!

Most dogs avoid hitting with ff once the height goes up, so we don’t want those no -- just limit her speed on the approach to get 5 stride rf hits. More height will discourage 4 strides anyway. Some gtcg never hurts either.

Great, we have 2 cues! One more question, last one I promise! Is it best to work on getting to full height before we do proofing like different start spots and approach speeds, or better to do all that at this height and then go up again and do it all again? Very grateful for your help, I have something positive to work with now, after getting varying advise from elsewhere and getting confused (which is why we gave up last year!)!

We just finished Running Contacts December class and now we are trying to manage running contacts by ourselves.
But we ran out of ideas. We have tried to change the starting spot and my ball trowing but her success rate is still very low. I guess she is leaping sometimes?

Sorry to bother you here but maybe you can help us out with some good ideas

Here is the video of her last three sessions. Right now we are doing 2-3 sessions per week, should we do more?

I have some trouble working out what kind of set up I like/am able to have. This one we both enjoy, even though I would rather be able to use a lowered DW and increase height. Is this set up OK? Will be get brilliant RC working like this? If so -- do I only bring her up higher on the DW when the angle is more like the real DW?

Dear Silvia.
Last time i had problem with focus ahead. It is better now I think.
Now we have another problem. She changes the rhythm and tries to make third part of DW in one stride, so she is very high or before zone. We have also problems with game on the end of dw.

That’s a typical PyrShep problem yes -- too long stride for 5 strides, too short for 4. This is what I get with Le if I train on short DWs, so I only train on 4m DW and then she does 5 strides in trials out of habit. Le’s sister has the same problem and no longer DW, so she uses carpet extension to make it look longer. Another thing that helps is to work on advanced exits as that promotes a bit less speed on a down ramp as well, so I would focus on that now. I don’t really think she needs gtcg as she is clearly trying to hit when doing the whole DW, she just needs to figure out her striding.

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Silvia Trkman is known for bringing every dog, from her first dog on, to the very top of the sport. Her dogs are known for great speed, tight turns, running contacts and long and injury-free careers. Silvia is in agility since 1992 and is

– 3x World Champion (and the only one ever to win it with two different dogs)

– 5x European Open winner, with 4 different dogs (Lo, La, Bu, Le)!!!
– National Championships podium and World Team member with every dog she’s ever had
– National Champion for 22-times (with 5 different dogs of 3 different breeds)

– World Team member for 19-times (mostly with at least two dogs at the time – sometimes four 🙂 )